Who I am.

I write about the landscape of grief, nature, and the wisdom of fools. The author of four books, my essays, poems, and reviews have been published in over 50 journals, including in the Huffington Post and Colorado Review. I’ve won the River Teeth Nonfiction Book Award, the Chautauqua and Literal Latte’s essay prizes, and my work has been nominated for four Pushcart Prizes and named a notable by Best American Essays. My account of hiking in Yosemite to deal with my wife’s death, Mountains of Light, was published by the University of Nebraska Press. http://www.markliebenow.com.

Tuesday, September 24, 2013

The Great Dead Calm


Journal entry 22

Four months after Ev’s death, life stops moving.

Everyone speaks words of cardboard. The same song plays over and over, wearing out whatever emotions used to exist in its notes. The world’s happy sounds are flat tones masked by white noise. I am Buster Keaton’s blank face because I feel nothing. I drift on the dead calm sea that old-time sailors feared when no wind filled their sails and they moved to the ocean’s whims. 

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